Tara McPherson

For the longest time, Valentine’s Gifts were solely limited to the two aisles in the seasonal section of your favorite discount store. Which is usually picked clean by the time you get there, limiting your gift options between a bag full of fun sized Mars bars and a white stuffed animal holding a velvet red heart. Neither of which convey the sense of any real time or effort spent on your loved one, not to mention most store bought Valentine’s stuff is pretty cheesy and generic.

That's why this Valentine’s Day, we suggest getting your lover something as special as they make you feel with an Artistic Wood Print! Don’t know which one to get? Here’s three of our favorite artists whose work goes hand in hand with the spirit of this holiday!

JERIMIAH KETNER

Chock full of whimsical wide-eyed women and fun feathered friends, Jerimiah’s artwork reaches critical levels of cuteness without feeling forced or gimmicky, radiating a sweet and gentle energy with his combination of fluorescent colors. It might not be a heart-shaped box of chocolates, but the artwork of Jerimiah Ketner looks how candy tastes… sweet!

LIDIJA PARADINOVIC NAGULOV

Lidija specializes in illustrating dreamy floral patterns, offering several color variations of the same design, which when displayed side by side, could be considered a…. beautiful bouquet? Ok, maybe I’m forcing the whole Valentine's / Flowers parallel a little too hard, but we’re pretty sure if you give one of these as a gift this February, you and your Valentine will definitely be putting your tulips together. (GET IT!?) ;)

TARA McPHERSON

Tara’s artwork is so beautiful, it’s like a Valentine for your eyes. With a recurring theme of a heart-shaped holes going straight through the chest of her gorgeous glowing girls, some might see this symbolistic of love lost. Although given the inviting stares and subtle smirks of her vibrant vixens, I’d like to think they’re waiting for something / someone to come along and fill the hole in their hearts with love, making them whole.

Tara McPherson? More like Tara Mc-FIERCE-son! Get it? Because... you know... that... uh... er.... um... yeah. Lame jokes aside, we love Tara McPherson! We got a chance to speak with her at DesignerCon 2016 where she revealed her newest print release for 2017: Electric Lola

If you've been following along. D-CON 2016 has come and gone, but all the fun still lives on in our hearts! Why? Because it was awesome, that’s why! What was so awesome about it you might ask?

Pictured Above: This is why I'm broke.

If you’ve ever been to Comic-Con before they started air-dropping celebrities in to promote their lackluster super hero cross-over movie sequels, the edges of the convention center would have more homegrown offerings ranging from cool posters to collectible toys.

Batman and Robin looking a little.... ambiguous.

As Comic-Con began to grow in popularity, so did the big corporations and their booths. This expansion started to push out the smaller vendors to the point where all that’s remaining of the art-geek scene congregated into a small sliver roughly 3 aisles wide, in addition to a handful of booths peppered across the entire convention center.

Pictured Above: The intellectual equivalent of my teenage mind.

Sure, standing for line for 4 hours to get Nicolas Cage to sign your t-shirt is fun and all, but for me, the best part of Comic-Con was looking for neat things to slap on my wall or pose on my bookcase. To make a long-boring story short, Designer Con is awesome because it takes that small sliver of indie artists, custom vinyl toys, and all sorts of one of a kind art and wraps an entire convention around it.

If advertisers we're honest.

Spanning over 90,000 square feet, D-CON packs a myriad of Artists from all walks of life… be it graffiti, low-brow, toys, or clothing, you’re guaranteed to see someone you recognize if you’re into this sort of thing. If you’re not, then we promise you’ll still see all sorts of awesome merch and collectibles.

Don't know what that is... but I WANT one!

As a sponsor of the event and also a vendor, we at PRINTS ON WOOD always feel at home when we attend. Granted, we sell limited edition art prints, but more-so because at heart, we’re all a bunch of art-nerds! Best part is we got to spend an entire weekend with some of our favorite artists!

D-CON / PRINTS ON WOOD Booth 2016

This year we had some of the biggest names from the industry were signing their exclusive POW/D-CON limited editions prints at our booth. Saturday we had the pleasure of hosting ...

Renee French(making smoking look adorable)

Luke Chueh(making himself look adorkable)

KMNDZ (signing prints based off of his live painted piece from last year's D-Con)

and Matt Gondek, "blowing it up" at our booth (Haha... get it?)

Sundays at D-CON are always a little more chill, but just as much fun. We had Tara McPherson kick it at our booth, promoting her awesome print release, The Fountain.

Last, but certainly never to be considered the least, we had Jermaine Rogers signing his exclusive D-CON/POW wood print, Tell Me How To Help You...

While we love all those people and think they're super cool, we have to be honest. They weren't the only important guests at our booth this year. That's right. The people that make us the happiest at D-CON this year, and every year, is ALL OF YOU!

Pictured Above: Some of you!

Prints On Wood wants to thank each and every one of you who came by our booth at D-CON 2016. Those of you who bought a print, shook our hand, asked for a sticker, told us we had a cool logo, and yes... even those of you who rolled your eyes when we told you how much some of the bigger prints cost! You are what makes this company and what we do great!

Although we've got a lot of people on the inside who help with that too!

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For those of you who couldn't make it out this year, stay tuned to Prints On Wood as we'll start release some of our limited edition, exclusive D-CON wood prints shortly!

For the past few weeks, our staff has been hard at work with assisting various artists print their artwork on wood pieces to prepare for DesignerCon.

DesignerCon is an annual art and design convention that will feature collectible toys, customs, plush, designer apparel - as well as urban, underground, and pop art. Artists and designers will be able set up their own booths and showcase their artwork and designs. This year, DCon will take place on November 19-20, and will feature over 150+ artists.

(created by artist Matt Gondek)

With Designer Con quickly approaching, many artists have asked for our help with creating wood prints. Typically, these artists send us their designs and we take care of the rest of the work.

(created by artist Joe Ledbetter)

Why wood prints? Well to start, they're a truly unique canvas that adds another beautiful dimension to artwork. It enhances and transforms the original piece with a natural, more vintage feel. The wood grain gives the artwork a unique appearance, so in a way - no two pieces are the same. Printing art on wood creates a durable, beautiful image that these artists can proudly display anywhere.

(created by artist Tara McPherson)

The photos above are just a few examples of the awesome pieces we've created for previous artists. These pieces will be displayed at DesignerCon, so keep an eye out while you're there!

If you're an artist and you want to see what the hype about printing on wood is about, contact us or check out our website for more information! You won't regret it!

For our third year in a row, PRINTS ON WOOD is rocking the house at D-CON 2016!

What is D-CON you might ask? Besides sounding like a Transformer with a 2.0 grade average, D-CON actually stands for DESIGNER CON. Although that might sound like a bunch of bearded hipsters wearing plaid shirts, congregating at their local coffee shop to argue the merits of Arial Vs. Helvetica, I assure you it’s way less pretentious than it sounds!

Underneath that man-bun, he’s secretly judging your font choices.

D-CON is kind of like Comic Con... minus the long lines, summer heat, and gender neutral / body positive cosplay. It’s an annual art and design convention taking place November 19th & 20th at the Pasadena Convention Center, featuring 150 different Comic Book Artists, Graffiti Artists, and… uh.. Artist Artists. The best part is that all these weird wonderful people get together to sell awesome looking toys, posters, dolls, t-shirts, and… *drumroll*... PRINTS ON WOOD!!!

Prints On Wood Booth: D-Con 2015

That’s right, PRINTS ON WOOD is bringing it’s big ‘ol honkin juggernaut of a wooden booth. and a whole slew of exclusive limited edition wooden art prints from the some of the biggest names attending D-CON this year, with featured art from all of your Prints on Wood favorites!

Some of them are even going to stop by our booth and hang out to sign your prints over this 2-Day Shabang!

We've got a lot of prints headed to the upcoming Designer Convention in November.

Today, we'll be focusing on the work of Tara McPherson - a renowned artist from New York City. She was born in San Francisco in 1976 and raised in LA, California. McPherson is known for creating magical art about people and the complexities of human nature. She creates otherworldly characters to give us a sneak peek into the complexities of the human mind and psyche. Her artwork focuses on myths, legends, astronomy, love, loss, and life.

Tara McPherson has been named the crown princess of poster art by ELLE magazine, and has created many posters for large rock bands. Her work has also been published in many books - as well as films. Tara's art is displayed in magazines, art galleries, and shows from all over the world. To read more about her, click the link here.

Here's a great new piece she's created called "The Wanderers":

This fine art wood print will be one of the marquee prints at our Designer Con booth. Designer Con is an annual art and design convention that brings together over 350 artists, vendors, distributors, and retailers to share art, designer toys, apparel, and etc. This two-day event takes place on November 19th & 20th, with tickets ranging from $10-$25.

Want to see Tara and get a chance to purchase some of her artwork? Purchase your ticket for DCon today!

Thursday, June 23rd, Atlanta's ABV Gallery -- which is founded by friend of POW and skilled muralist Greg Mike -- is joining forces with Prints on Wood and OuterSpace Projects to celebrate the release of several limited edition prints. This is the place to be Thursday to grab some exclusive eco-friendly art, plus grab some sold out prints from the POW vault. Each print comes with the option of including a custom frame.

All of the prints included in this release measure in a 14"x14" and will be availalbe for $100. While prints will be available at ABV Gallery, they will also be available in a time released online release beginning at 1pm PST on Thursday and ending Wednesday, June 29th at midnight. Additionally, a portion of the proceeds will go towards benefitting the FCancer Organization.

Simply RSVP here for entry into the event, and be sure to keep your eyes peeled for those exclusive online released prints to come.

The following is the list of the artist that will have releases:

Arlin

Matt Gondek

Greg Mike

Drew Merritt

Mac Stewart

Felipe Pantone

Tommy Bronx

Wolfdog

2Alias

In another part of the gallery, find exclusive, sold out POW collaborations from artists:

If you have ever had the chance to experience an event curated by Bob Self, then you have had the opportunity to be swept off your feet with amazing talent and wonder that surrounds his events. In his upcoming exhibit Baby Tattoo: Carnival of Astounding Art at the Oceanside Museum of Art, Bob Self is bringing a collaborative experience from all of his events to one place. This is a huge exhibition featuring the many artists who have been apart of the Baby Tattoo story, including Mark Ryden, Marion Peck, Jeff Soto, Tara McPherson, Luke Chueh, Joe Sorren, Audrey Kawasaki, Robert Williams, Travis Louie and Lola to name a few.

Bob Self has been hosting Baby Tattooville events that bring together artists and collectors in an intimate weekend experience at the timeless Mission Inn. The exhibit will feature the art collaborations created at each Baby Tattooville event, the Art Jam. The Art Jam is the culmination of the weekend long collaboration by all the attending artists. The Art Jam piece from each of the last eight years will be on exhibit at the Oceanside Museum of Art.

The ninth and final Baby Tattooville event will feature Mark Ryden and Marion Peck. The culminating event will feature, for the first time, a Surrealist Ball with grand costumes and more to be announced.

The Carnival of Astounding Art will present a sampling of all the art and artists that have contributed and have been a part of Bob Self's events and book publishing. We have had the privilege to be a part of two of the Beyond Brookledge events in 2014 and 2015. We were able to donate two fine art prints on wood, "The Amazing Mort" by Travis Louie and "We See What We Seek" by Zelda Devon, shown in the top and bottom photos.

It would be hard to find a person that has not heard of ComicCon, well at least in Southern California. You know, that little convention in San Diego with an attendance of over 130,000 people. Well, it wasn't always that popular, just a few years ago it was a relatively modest comic book and science fiction/fantasy convention. It was also a place were up and coming, along with established pop artists could show and sell their latest work.

In recent years, because of the rising booth space costs and the expense, not to mention hassle, of attending ComicCon, many artists and vendors began to look for other options. Two of those vendors being October Toys (Ayleen Gaspar) and 3D Retro (Ben Goretsky) who happen to be the co-producers of.....yep you guessed it, DesignerCon.

Considering they are both manufactures of collectable toys, it made sense that DesignerCon initially focused on collectable toys and figures. Within a few years, pop art found its way in through a natural crossover as so many contemporary artists release both toys and prints interchangeably.

We found out about DesignerCon or more commonly know as "DCon" just after the 2013 convention. After a few enthusiastic reviews, we couldn't wait for DCon 2014! With months of planning, booth building, print making behind us, on Friday, November 7th we were ready for DCon!

Setting up the booth: Here is where the fun begins! We roll into DCon and see Jeff Soto setting up his booth right behind us and To Die For setting up on the other side, we could not have asked for a more perfect combination of neighbors....umm well uhh.. asking helps too. (thanks Ayleen and Ben!) Not sure if Soto will be as excited to be our neighbor next year after he pulled out the longest sliver I have ever seen.

Sorry Jeff, that looks like it hurt, good thing it wasn't your drawing hand.

Immediately we begin uncrating and setting up the booth walls, hanging the art and in no time the booth begins to take shape. Before we finish Luke Chueh swings by, after fighting a few hours of Friday night LA traffic to sign his Boba prints and the marquee print.

I think he was just as excited as we were about the release the next day.

Before we go, Jason Limon finishes signing the Catcreeper figures and Berrytop Swirlpapa. He is jumping back and forth from setting up his booth to taking care of the print release with our booth. That's after a 20 hour drive from Texas the day before! Your amazing Jason!

As they begin to kick everyone out of the hall we are the last to leave, but at long last, the booth is done!

DAY 1: D-Day is here and we are ready...well almost! Before the show opens Chris Ryniak stops by to sign the official DCon prints, with not much sleep, I won't mention how many times we lost count signing the prints. My brain definitely needs a few hours to warm up when computing large math problems like 12 plus 1.

As if right on cue, in comes the beautiful Tara McPherson ready to sign her release of Umibozu Lake. A little Starbucks and a silver sharpie is all she needs to get through 100 prints in no time flat!

Once those are done, we are ready to roll! Oh wait, where's Jeff Soto?? His booth is right behind us... we steal him over for a few minutes to sign his prints.

Nathan Ota comes by and creates the perfect photo opp with Jeff and the big marquee prints.

Then Nathan grabs a chair and begins to draw on the back side of each print in his DCon release of Early Bird.

It was amazing to see first hand his immense talent and desire to give each print a special touch, making each one a sort of original.

Boba! Boba! Boba! For the first hour of the show it was the most used word and for about two hours, Luke was busy signing and doodling on the back of the prints.

Just like Nathan, Luke Chueh took his time to draw a unique sketch for each fan who patiently waited in an line that stretched on for over an hour.

Luke was busy signing prints for over two hours until he had to run off to another booth that was releasing his vinyl toy. Around that time Johnny KMNDZ Rodriguez was there to pick up where Luke left off. Johnny's print "Nothing New Under the Sun" was his first release with us, we were pumped to premier it at DCon.

Maybe we just got lucky but every artist we worked with at DCon was gracious, down to earth and most of all generous with the time they spent with each fan that came to visit them at the booth.

In between signings we broke away from the booth to walk around the convention, do a bit of shopping ourselves and meet some of the other vendors.

One of the first stops was at one of our favorite artist's booth, Jason Limon. His hand made figures were incredible, we couldn't leave with out taking home one of the strange creatures.

This ^^^ lucky fellow has a new forever home with us.

But our home was not complete with out a few other peculiar looking creators to keep him company.

The only problem is you can't take just one, you know.. they get lonely. Yep, we have a pair, not identical twins, fraternal, they have the same momma, Circus Posterus.

By the time we got back to our booth To Die For was hosting an artist signing with Craola and the line was overflowing down the isle. Afterwards he stopped by our booth to sign his marquee print, "Puppets Pathos“.

Always incredibly friendly and polite, it was great catching up with Craola before he had to leave to another event that evening. Which also marked the end of Day One! And an unbelievably great day at that!

DAY 2: One of the best part of Sunday was opening the convention at 10 am, but the next best thing was opening with Jason Limon signing at the booth.

The release of our first dimensional art piece, The Catcreeper, was the brain child of Jason. The first sketch was drawn on this plane ride home after his first visit to Prints on Wood.

We love to experiment with new ideas and materials so we jumped at the opportunity to try something new.

Speaking of new, Jeff Soto's marquee piece, The Soto Fish, was a collaborative print/original piece where we alternated printing and painting on the medium including a bit of hand laid gold leaf on the tooth of the "fish".

This was a test run for a smaller edition of prints coming soon in 2015.

For DCon, Jeff re-released "The Guitarist Seeker" in a limited edition larger print, twice the size as the original 6x6 release.

Probably the most sought after print at our booth was the little Soto Fish prints that were given away for a IG post and mailing list sign up. By Sunday afternoon over 400 Soto Fish prints had swam into the arms of happy DCon attendees and most of them signed by the artist himself.

Rounding out the day, Tara McPerson came back to a line of fans eager to meet her.

Her marquee piece "Supernova II" was a personal favorite and may be a release coming soon...

At the conclusion of Designer Con 2014, we were extremely pleased with the whole experience and cannot wait until next year to raise the bar further. We already have tons of ideas floating around to make the event even better (Hint: double the size?). We would also like to sincerely thank our artists and buyers for their continued support. Without all of you this could not have been made possible. Thanks to you, we are able to successfully create art that embraces style rooted in sustainability. See you next year!